Common Truths

Common Truths Educational Tour Activities & Strategies for: Donna Langhorne: Common Truths Curated and organized by the Organization of Saskatchewan Arts Councils (OSAC) and toured through OSAC’s Arts on the Move program. Table of Contents PART I - INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................................... 2 Introducing the exhibition: Common Truths ..................................................................................... 2 Exhibition Essay ............................................................................................................................... 2 Artist Statement .............................................................................................................................. 5 Introducing the Artist ....................................................................................................................... 7 Vocabulary ...................................................................................................................................... 8 Woodland Art Vocabulary ................................................................................................................ 9 Ojibway Vocabulary ....................................................................................................................... 10 PART II – TOUR ENGAGAMENT ............................................................................................. 11 Pre-Tour Activities ......................................................................................................................... 11 Colour Sorting Game (Recommended for Grades 2-6) ..................................................................................... 11 Exploring Feelings with Colour (Recommended for Grades K-2) ....................................................................... 13 Exploring Feelings & Emotional Language with Art (Recommended for Grades 3-5) ........................................ 14 Exploring Feelings & Emotional Language with Art Using Cree (Recommended for Grade 6-9) ........................ 16 Exploring Feelings & Language Loss with Art Using Cree (Recommended for Grade 9-12) ............................... 17 The Tour ........................................................................................................................................ 19 Tour Activities ................................................................................................................................ 22 Description Game with a Focus on Colour (Recommended for Grades K-8) .................................................... 22 Sensory Y- Chart (Recommended for Grades 4-12) .......................................................................................... 24 Contour Line Drawing (Recommended for Grades 5-12) .................................................................................. 26 Post-Tour Activities ........................................................................................................................ 28 Resistance Painting (Recommended for Grades 1-8) ....................................................................................... 28 Crayon Resistance with Animals (Recommended for Grades 3-8) ................................................................... 29 X-Ray Painting (Recommended for Grades 4-12) ............................................................................................. 31 PART III - ADDITIONAL INFORMATION .................................................................................. 33 List of Works .................................................................................................................................. 33 OSAC Visual Arts Exhibition Schedule ............................................................................................. 62 Organization of Saskatchewan Arts Councils .................................................................................. 64 PART I - INTRODUCTION Introducing the exhibition: Common Truths Toured through OSAC’s Arts on the Move program. Exhibition Essay Donna Langhorne: Common Truths Exhibition Essay by Peter Sametz The stream of time has brought us to a peculiar junction, where allegations of “fake news” and assertions of “alternative facts” blur the line between truth and falsehood. It is an age where irony, once presumed dead, abounds. Case in point: although the tools of documentation and communication at our disposal have never been as sophisticated, our capacity to discern fiction from fact has become more, not less, complicated. Historical revisionism trades as the currency of the day, both counterfeit and genuine. One breeds denial through imagined conspiracy; the other seeks to expose the dust of fraud and deceit surreptitiously swept under the carpet of history. Such twists and turns erode the bedrock of our national identity, calling into question our taught heritage. For example, the travesties unveiled by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada [TRC] and the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls testify to a turbulent undercurrent that challenges the country’s national mythos. Against this backdrop a unique voice has emerged from Northern Saskatchewan through the steady hand and keen eye of Donna Langhorne [aka “Donna the Strange”]. In 2014, this self-styled artist began to explore new thematic territory, moving from a fascination with abstract horror and pop iconography to a focus on issues of contemporary Indigenous identity. Her introduction to the powerful canon of Norval Morrisseau sparked a personal renaissance and provided a formalistic means for her to synthesize and capture visionary observations on both the plight of Indigenous persons in our day and prospects for moving ahead in a positive way. In short order she has established a national reputation as a Woodlands artist, pushing the boundaries of the movement. With continued support from the Saskatchewan Arts Board, the artist first tested these ideas in her 2016/17 series, Seven Visions. That project considered how the Seven Sacred Teachings in Indigenous culture provide opportunities for healing in the context of Reconciliation. Common Truths, supported by both the Canada Council for the Arts and the Saskatchewan Arts Board, allowed her to continue this work. Interestingly, there is a duality to the expression “common truths” that invites the presence of Thalia and Melpomene, the respective Greek Muses of comedy and tragedy. The former consigns what is “common” to the banal and trivial. In this sense, “common truths” speak to the universal experience of what is confounded and absurd, as in the case of so-called Murphy’s Law [‘anything that can go wrong, will go wrong’]. In contrast, the tragic sense of commonality draws on shared or collective experience. Such truths plumb depths of human ordeals that are poignant and profound. As it turns out, both Muses vie for attention here. To be sure, the twenty paintings shed light on heartbreaking realities, cross-referenced as they are to the TRC ‘calls to action’ and UNDRIP [the UN Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous People]. But they also remind us that these problems have become institutionalized, their victims chastised and dismissed as of little value or import. There are several noteworthy structural elements to the series. Firstly, each painting is titled by a single word, reinforcing the fact that even brutal truths are simple in conception and perpetration. Secondly, just as many of the paintings incorporate the use of lines to connect subject matter and symbols, the overall presentation of the work is symmetrically configured to illustrate how the truths depicted are intertwined. Thus, while the paintings are contained by the geometry of their surfaces, the symmetries of both the overall pattern and each of the five groupings liberate them to act in concert. Most significantly, the artist draws upon her Anishinaabe heritage [Plains Ojibway] as a member of Fishing Lake First Nation in Saskatchewan. In particular, she does so through its pentagonal kinship structure, connecting clan doodems [animal totems] to specific subject areas. In this way, each of the representative doodems is imagined to lead the resolution of its associated issue, thereby serving as a beacon of hope for healing and revitalization. Analytically, the installation breaks down as follows: • Group 1: Giishkizhigwan [teachers] o Gather [lost traditions] – Snapping Turtle o Stung [treaty betrayal] - Frog o Forbidden [language suppression] - Snake o Hooked [addiction] – Catfish • Group 2: Nooke [protectors] o Silenced [residential schools] - Lynx o Remember [youth suicide] – Grizzly Bear o Taken [60’s scoop] - Wolf o Missing [MMIW] – Bear • Group 3: Bimaawidaasi [hunters and gatherers] o Buried [sacred sites] - Moose o Hunted [hunting rights] - Muskrat o Poisoned [drinking water] - Rabbit o Jailed [disproportionate incarceration] – Beaver • Group 4: Baswenaazhi [communicators] o Stuck [human trafficking] – Bald Eagle o Rise [Stereotypes] - Thunderbird o Assimilated [cultural genocide] - Crane o Owned [gang affiliation] – Hawk • Group 5: Bemaangik [peace-makers] o Breath [urban residency] - Loon o Smudged [banned ceremony] - Kingfisher o Fierce [2-Spirited] - Partridge o Diseased [infected gifts] – Black Duck With bold colours and strongly delineated lines, each painting has a magnetic attraction that increasingly unsettles the

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